COULTER’S SUIT IS AKIN TO THE POT CALLING THE KETTLE BLACK

Every now and then, something comes along that’s so rich you believe that, yes, there is a patron saint of columnists — and he’s got a buttery sense of irony.

Every now and then, even when the mornings are colder than a witch’s mammary gland, manna rains down in the form of warm chocolate croissants, fresh out of the oven.

While I’d intended to file a sober screed today — an update on California’s tragically unimplemented Laura’s Law was on the to-write list — this delicious dolt out of the blue cannot be left undigested.

As reported over the weekend, George Coulter, a former board member of Tri-City Healthcare District, has filed a lawsuit against recently elected Trustee Wayne Lingenfelter over an ethical lapse that Coulter believes disqualifies Lingenfelter from the board.

Oh, my goodness. This is the crock-of-dung pot calling the kettle black. In terms of chutzpah, this is like:

• Lance Armstrong filing a complaint against 2012 Tour de France winner Bradley Wiggins for suspected doping. “Champions must not seek an illegal advantage,” Armstrong huffs. “It’s just not right. What kind of message does it send to kids?”

• Bernie Madoff calling upon the SEC to probe the books of Warren Buffett, the Sage of Omaha, for a suspected Ponzi scheme. “Look, no one can rack up legitimate profits year after year,” Madoff explains. “I know from long experience.”

• Randall Harold Cunningham, disgraced war hero stationed in a halfway house in Louisiana, raising the alarm on recently elected Congressman Scott Peters for “buying” the 2012 election. “This flooding of Congress with money has to stop,” Cunningham intones. “It’s just obscene.”

If a judge were to bounce Lingenfelter for his faux pas over his residential address, Coulter, an incumbent who finished fifth, 2,000 votes behind Lingenfelter in the November election, could in theory be among those the board would consider for appointment.

To understand just how kooky Coulter’s lawsuit against Lingenfelter is, let’s go back to 2008 when Coulter barely won the fourth, and last, open seat on the Tri-City board, edging out incumbent Darlene Garrahy by 56 votes.

No one can say exactly how many votes were swayed by the impressive “Dr.” in front of Coulter’s name, but I’m guessing at least 57.

A critical mass of credulous voters could have been misled in two ways:

First, they could have assumed Coulter was a “real” doctor. After all, his profession was described as “psychiatric therapist,” evoking visions of Freud or Jung.

In fact, Coulter’s job was more akin to an orderly in a psychiatric ward.

Second, voters could have logically assumed he earned a Ph.D. from an accredited university, a title that confers a certain degree of intellectual heft. (“Hey, he may not be able to prescribe pills, but he must be a brainy guy.”)

Three years after his narrow victory, the truth came out about Coulter’s Ph.D. — and it wasn’t flattering. His gravitas turned to gravel.

At best, he bought a fake degree from a shady diploma mill that disappeared under a criminal cloud. At worst, he made up the title to puff himself up.

In the 2012 election, Coulter dropped the disputed “doctor” but continued to profess that he had completed a course of study from a chimerical Orange County college. He couldn’t remember professors or anyone on his dissertation committee. He said a former girlfriend stole his sheepskin.

If anyone strongly suspects that Coulter committed a form of election fraud in 2008, raise your hands. (Both of mine are up.)

So this — this — is the “doctor” who claims Lingenfelter, a former hospital CEO, is unworthy to serve.

Look, I’ll concede this much.

In the run-up to the election, Lingenfelter should have made a clear public statement about his unusual living situation. (He was staying in an apartment just outside the district, but he intends to move into an inside-district house he owns and uses as his permanent address.)

In an ideal world, the ethics matter will be legally sorted out, as will any role, if any, of the Tri-City executive office in generating opposition research against Lingenfelter, a savvy former executive who’s been appointed to the important budget committee.

In late October, the U-T’s Watchdog team filed a public records request on Tri-City research into candidates, including Lingenfelter. Nothing came of the request, but it remains an open question, at least in my mind, whether Tri-City officials were using public resources to discredit Lingenfelter’s campaign, which, if so, would violate state law.

In the same vein, did Coulter initiate (and pay for) this lawsuit on his own — or is he someone else’s willing surrogate?